


The Truth About Wolves

by moonlight1314



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: BAMF Allison, BAMF!Stiles, Bromance, Derek Hale is Bad at Feelings, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Minor Character Death, Pack Feels, Scott is a Good Friend, bamf!Lydia
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-25
Updated: 2017-08-16
Packaged: 2018-08-24 14:54:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8376391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonlight1314/pseuds/moonlight1314
Summary: With the Alphas quickly approaching Derek and company need a united pack. Funnily enough, no one agrees. Stiles wishes everyone would finally grow up; Lydia finds that people are not generally valued enough, and Derek learns to use his words (sometimes).





	1. Wet and Ebola-infected

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rei](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rei/gifts), [apfelhalm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/apfelhalm/gifts).
  * A translation of [Die Wahrheit über Wölfe](https://archiveofourown.org/works/973960) by [Rei](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rei/pseuds/Rei). 



> Author's Notes-  
> Spoilers/Timeline: Starts directly after season 2, spoilers for all of season 1, and just about every Stiles & Derek scene in canon. But I am determined to change some things from s3 – especially with Erica.
> 
> Warnings: As always, full of cheesiness, trouble, and a lot of dialogue. Derek is bad at using words. In addition, werewolves can turn into real wolves, because that’s a lot cooler. ;P
> 
> Disclaimer: Nothing belongs to me, it all belongs to Jeff Davis.

Chapter 1: Wet and Ebola-infected

 

(The Truth about Wolves by Rei17)

It’s cold.  
Stiles is just a human, okay? He freezes. Especially at night and in abandoned train stations that the wind whistles through. But every time he even thinks to open his mouth to complain, Derek looks at him and growls.  
Seriously. He growls. Like a dog. Like a big, biting Doberman. Or a bear.  Like some large predator- with many sharp teeth.

Stiles works his mouth shut and crosses his arms.  
There's no respect.

Derek has already shown how he feels about Stiles showing up at the ‘secret midnight werewolf meeting.’ At least, if his gaze and growled ‘ _What are you doing here?_ ’ is any indication of his feelings.  
Stiles is not offended by that. Not a bit.

He doesn’t even know why he came, only that Scott knocked on his window in the middle of the night.  
Actually, he’s on house arrest until he is thirty-five anyway.

He throws a pleading look at Scott, but Scott stalks up and down— seriously, where do all the predator metaphors come from?— Waving his arms wildly and is too busy being angry to realize that Stiles is slowly but surely turning into an icicle.

“No!”

That is the word that has been said the most in the last half hour. _No,_ Scott will not join Derek’s pack. _No,_ Derek does not think that he has to meet with the Argents. _No,_ Jackson does not feel that this has anything to do with him.

This is all super-productive.  
Maybe, for the sake of changing things up, they can say it in French or Russian.  
Non. Niet.  
At least, that might be entertaining.

Stiles might have a bit more to say than ‘No,’ but apparently no one is interested in his opinion. Clearly, people here are discriminated against. He should protest. “ _Hello, my name is Stiles and werewolves discriminate against my right to freedom of expression that is guaranteed by the Constitution.”_  
Yes. Exactly.  
He can see how well that would go.

The only werewolf who is contributing something other than straight out rejection to the conversation is Isaac, who is chewing helplessly on his fingernails, and throwing out sentences that start with _“Yeah, but…”_ that no one listens to in the end.  
Isaac is a wimp. He has no chance against the combined anger of Scott, Derek, and Jackson. Stiles would almost feel sorry for him if he wasn’t a best friend stealing werewolf. Yes, he has noticed that lately, Scott has been saying _“Isaac said”_ or _“Isaac and I thought”_ and that Scott has already pushed back World of Warcraft night three times to go run in the forest and hunt rabbits, or whatever werewolves do in their spare time.  
He’s not angry about it.  
Okay, maybe a little. And only in the dark when no one is looking.

He plucks at the frayed mattress that he’s sitting on. Somewhere in the background water is dripping on the floor, and the few lamps that are there are flickering ominously over them. Cold air is rushing past through any crack it can find. All-in-all, Stiles is not impressed with Derek’s new accommodations. Please, who sees a deserted train station and thinks THIS is my cozy new home?  
Derek. Of course. Who else.

But Derek looks like he gets up in the morning and gargles with barbed wire.  
Comfort and ambiance are two words that simply do not show up in his vocabulary. Just like _“thank you, Stiles,”_   _“you were a really big help, Stiles,”_ or _“we would all be gone without you, Stiles.”_ It’s something that is long overdue.

Stiles’ eyes flick over to Lydia.  
For about the seventh time in as many minutes.  
She is sitting about six feet away from him, as beautiful and unattainable as a precious stone in a velvet lined case. Just looking at her gives him phantom pains, reminding him of the imprint of Gerard’s fist on his face that’s now a faded greenish-yellow, but still hurts when he laughs.  
He didn’t expect her to be here.

Lydia has her legs crossed and is looking at her lilac nails. To any outsider who hasn’t watched her the last eight years of her life she might look bored and uninterested.  
But not to Stiles.

She has her makeup layered on thick, so thick that you can’t see the bags under her eyes. And her eyeliner is a bit blurred like her hands trembled when she applied it.  
Lydia Martin’s perfect mask is showing cracks.  
Stiles feels an unexpected swell of solidarity rise inside him. He never wanted her to be dragged into all this… he never wanted her to cry in front of him after knocking on his door asking for help… but he is incredibly grateful that she is here.  
Two people among wolves.

He shouldn’t look at her for too long, because ever since Jackson became a werewolf, he seems to have developed an uncanny sixth sense for when someone stares at his girlfriend.  
At least Stiles thinks she is his girlfriend again after their epic love saved not only the world, but Jackson from the realm of the dead werelizards too, or whatever happened that night.  
Mostly Stiles doesn’t want to think about it.  
It’s short-circuited his brain.

Nine seconds. Stiles closes his eyes, just before he can feel Jackson’s dark gaze on him. He buries his hands under his armpits and inwardly counts to ten before he opens his eyes again. From the corner of his eye, he can just see Jackson turn his head again.

Relieved, he exhales before tensing everything in his body.  
There is still a pair of eyes resting on his face, and it’s not Jackson.  
It’s Derek.

Stiles’ heart stops in his chest with a painful jerk.  
Derek is staring at him from across the room. His face is partially shaded and is unreadable, and his eyes are like small, red reflectors in the dark.  
Stiles thinks that this is how a rabbit caught in the headlights must feel. He feels caught and oddly breathless.

“I’m cold,” he blurts out. A moment later he wishes he could take it back as the conversation ceased and everyone turned to look at him quizzically.

Scott stopped talking mid-sentence and Jackson, who looked as if he was about to kill Scott, pauses midway in the movement.  
Isaac squints over at Stiles.  
Even Lydia takes her eyes off her fingernails.

“You’re cold?” Scott looks puzzled for a second. Maybe he forgot that Stiles was even there. Or he can can’t remember how cold a human can sometimes be. Neither option is particularly flattering.  
But, then he makes sad puppy eyes as if he were personally responsible for ensuring that Derek keeps a creepy, icy underground station as the perfect accommodations or that Stiles is only a small human, made of pale skin and fragile bones. “You should’ve said that sooner.”

Stiles waves his hands. “I thought that the quiet but steady chattering of my teeth had been a clear indication! It _is_ cold here! And wet! And probably Ebola-ridden! Just for the record!”

Derek makes a noise that’s half sigh and half growl that is intended to express that Stiles is the bane of his entire existence. Or something like it. He rolls his eyes, and the menacing red glow disappears.  
He makes a vague gesture towards the darker end of the hall. “Over there somewhere...”

 “Rats?” Stiles suggests helpfully because it’s a sure thing.

“Blankets,” Isaac replied in Derek’s place. “Take a rest.”

Stiles stares at him shocked. “A blanket? From _here_? Excuse me! Do I look like I need hepatitis?”

Isaac has the decency to look embarrassed. Derek doesn’t. Derek bares his teeth. “Shut up, or I’ll…”

“…Rip my throat out? With your teeth?” says Stiles, because they’ve already played this game.

A sound impossible for a human to imitate comes from Derek’s throat, a deep rumble, and he has his claws and teeth extended.

“Okay, okay, it’s alright.” Stiles stumbles up from the mattress and makes a dismissive gesture. “No need to unpack the pearly whites. I’m looking for… something already. Go on ahead. Ignore me.”

“We do that anyway,” Jackson replied irritably.  
Unfortunately, even after being brought from the dead he still hasn't lost his innate assholishness. Stiles gives him a nasty look.

“Stiles.” Derek looks as if he has a headache. Stiles knows that look fairly well. He is most often the cause. “Pick _something._ ” The main thing ‘ _shut up_ ’ is quite clearly implied, even without the need to announce it.

Okay. Something.  
Stiles rolls his eyes – but only once Derek has his back turned, he’s not suicidal – and begins to walk aimlessly through the darker half of the palace of terror.  
His eyes need a moment to get used to the dim light. Everything looks gray, shadowy, and kind of creepy. Dust shimmers in the dim rays of light and the freight train with misted windows on the other side looks like a giant, sleeping dragon.  
Seriously. What has driven Derek to live here? Granted, the only alternative is a burnt, half a house in the forest, which doesn’t even have a functioning roof. But what about a nice hotel? A one-bedroom apartment? A sublet? Really, _anything_ would be an improvement.  
And what’s with the kids? (Puppies? Wolf babies?)

The thought of Erica gives him an unexpected lurch.  
Stiles stops a few feet away from the werewolf council at the center of the room, and a look crosses his face. He hasn’t slept properly in two days. But one of the images he sees whenever he closes his eyes is Erica, bound and gagged, in the Argent’s basement.

He doesn’t know what to make of it; the fact the up until a few weeks ago she didn’t play a major role in his life and now, in a relatively short time, has raised a lot of different feelings in him.

When he opens his eyes again, they have almost become accustomed to the dark stuffiness. In one corner is a dark heap that looks like the blankets Isaac was talking about. Someone has since built a nest.  
Stiles suppresses a grin.  
Dog jokes are no fun if there is nobody there to listen to him.

Even from six feet away, the old blankets smell of moths and as if you could contract fifty diseases if they come too close.  
Disgusted, Stiles backs away and stumbles against an iron stand. It clinks softly on the concrete floor as it rocks back and forth, but he manages to catch it reflexively.

He throws a wary glance to the lit center of the room, but Jackson and Scott are too busy trying to go for each other’s jugular to notice him. The only one whose eyes are flickering in his direction is Derek.  
Stiles is pretty sure that Derek can see him well enough even in the dark. Or listen to his pounding heartbeat.

He keeps very still, one hand on the iron stand and attempts to calm his pounding pulse. Something soft touches his hand, and he looks around in surprise. It takes a moment until he realizes what it is. Someone has misused a frame as a clothes rack and hung various garments from it. He can recognize several things that look like Isaac’s wooly jumpers and something that looks like a tiny dress. And a leather jacket. And not just _any_ leather jacket.  
It’s the ultimate badass leather jacket. _Derek’s_ ultimate badass leather jacket. Black and buttery soft with buckles on the shoulders.

As if on cue, a renewed wind chill whistles through the old walls and Stiles shudders. He feels goose bumps spread on his bare arms and wishes he had enough presence of mind to put on more than his old, frayed Star Wars t-shirt.  
Undecided, he runs his fingers up the soft sleeve of the leather jacket.  
He is absolutely not keen to know if Derek will still carry through with his threat and use his true power to bite him in the throat. On the other hand, he would have been able to do it half a dozen times and has so far restrained himself remarkably. And the jacket really does look incredibly warm…

‘ _Pick something,_ ’ Derek said.  
Okay. Please. Stiles lives to obey.  
_Something_. That naturally includes the leather jacket. No court in the world would decide otherwise.  
Anyway, it’s unfair that Derek equips every child offender in his small street gang with leather jackets, and Stiles still hasn’t got one. What is this? Is he not cool enough?

Before his superego can take command again, Stiles has already pulled the soft fabric over his shoulders. Reduced impulse control. He can’t help it, that’s genetic. There are reports about it and  
…  
Oh. My. _God._  
It’s so soft.

He exhales. And again.  
The jacket is warm and much softer than it looks. Stiles feels like he’s wrapped in a cocoon. The wind even seems to steer clear of him.  
He will never give it back, that’s for sure. And Derek can wait a long time.

It might be a little too broad in the shoulders because Derek is built like a concrete wall, but other than that it doesn’t sit too badly. Stiles isn’t that much smaller. He even has the vague suspicion that he still needs another growth spurt until he’s caught up with Derek.

Slowly, he goes back.  
Even from a few feet away he can hear the angry voices. Stiles rolls his eye, as his heartbeat accelerates involuntarily. After all, there are werewolves, and three of them are young and foolish, and the fourth has obvious anger management problems. And somewhere in the middle sits Lydia.

“An alpha pack? What do you mean, an Alpha Pack?”

“The name says it all, Scott. It is a pack full of alphas.”  
Derek has let loose the sarcasm. This can’t be a good sign. Whenever he is sarcastic, someone is close to dying. Mostly himself. Stiles speeds up his pace.

“That’s not really my problem!” Hisses Jackson. He has also extended his pearly whites. That’s not good. Not good at all.

“It will be your problem! You and Scott are omegas without a pack! What do you think they’ll do to you?”

Shit. Shit, shit, shit. Stiles has a big imagination, and he can imagine way too many bad things that angry werewolves could do to Scott. His heart falters, and there are Derek’s eyes again (red alpha eyes, which is not a good sign), landing on him.  
“What does that mean?” Asks Stiles softly as he steps out of the shadows. “What do they want here? Derek?”

Derek shrugs. “They’re certainly not just passing through,” he says, which is totally unnecessary and vaguely ominous. Then he’s aggravated and frowns more precisely when he sees Stiles.

“What does that mean?” Stiles drilled. “What do they have to do with us?”

Scott and Jackson turn, reluctant to face him.  
“Stiles…” Scott sounds frustrated. “That’s not… that’s just…” He makes a gesture in Derek’s direction. “It’s just one of his power plays again! Yet again it’s just about him!”

“As if were ever _not_ about you and your Allison Dependent heartache!” Derek is biting his teeth so hard that his jaw protrudes.

“My… I was only trying to help all of us!”

“And it wasn’t possible to help us without betraying us?”  
Derek sounds bitter.

Great. Here we go again. Welcome, ladies and gentlemen to the best of _‘Who betrayed who first and who concealed something first?’_ And tune in again tomorrow for _‘Which one of us have made the worst decisions in life and violated the most feelings with the least effort?’_

Stiles tries to say something, but then Derek wrinkles his forehead and says “Stiles, what…?” And Jackson pushes Scott out of the way, Scott’s eyes flash yellow, and Isaac tries to get between them, and everything escalated so quickly that Stiles naked eyes can hardly follow.  
Hopeless, he lowers his arms. They’ll have a full-blown werewolf brawl on their hands if it continues like this.

“I’m leaving!”  
Lydia stands up. Her voice echoed through the station. It sounds calm and controlled, but her face is twisted in disgust.

Jackson sighed, a hand clutching Scott’s T-shirt. “Wait Lydia, I’ll drive you right…”

Lydia raises an eyebrow, which silences him. “I didn’t say that I’m going with you.” Elegant she turns towards the stairs. “Stiles.” She points a finger at him, to rule out any ambiguity. Lydia always makes clear statements. “You can drive me home.”

Stiles blinks. “I… what? Okay. I mean…” He glances at Jackson, who looks thunderstruck. That alone is worth it. He nods vigorously. “Sure.”

“They don’t seem to value our input anyway.” She smiles sweetly. “I think they can thrash this out better without us.”

“Lydia!”

“Stiles!”

It’s almost funny how Jackson and Scott protest in exactly identical whiny tones and then immediately look horrified.

Derek is silent. He’s still staring at Stiles.

“Lydia…” protests Jackson. “It’s not safe out there!”

“I have pepper spray,” replies Lydia and saunters over to Stiles.

“Stiles,” Scott says reproachfully.

“I… uh… I have Lydia!” Stiles points at her. Lydia is like a mix of James Bond and MacGyver, just a lot more unscrupulous and with more lip gloss. They can probably build a bomb from a shoelace and chewing gum if they need to.

Lydia grabs his arm and links them together.  
“Right, we’ll be safe without you. Goodbye.”  
With these words, she pulls Stiles outside with her. Once Lydia gets going, you can’t stop her, and Stiles doesn’t even try.

“We don’t need them,” she says, while they are definitely still in earshot of sharp werewolf ears, and she makes no effort to lower her voice. “That’s the last straw.”

“Um… right.” Stiles nods. “Absolutely.”

“They can kindly do their shit without us. I don’t believe it.”

Stiles is almost certain that she said ‘us’ and actually meant it, and not just in the royal ‘us.’ She’s never done it before, and it causes an unfamiliar heat to rise in him.

“Stiles, wait a minute!” It’s Scott.

Stiles slows down and gives Lydia and apologetic look.

“It’s okay,” Lydia says generously before she left. “I’ll give you five minutes.”

He nods, buries his hands in his pockets, and stops.  
This is a conversation that he really doesn’t want to start now, especially not in earshot of three werewolves who can certainly head each word, and Lydia Martin standing there, waiting for him.  
“What for?”

“What? What does that mean?”

“Why should I stay here, Scott? It’s not as if anyone is interested in my opinion.” Stiles waves his arms around in extremely exaggerated movements using his whole body. “Human chew toy here, okay? Zero werewolf. No pearly whites. And apparently, that’s the only thing that gives you a right to vote here.”

“But… you’re my best friend!” Scott sounds genuinely hurt. “Of course I’m interested in your opinion.”

“Oh really?”

“Yes!”

“Okay.” Stiles takes a deep breath. “Fine. You won’t like it, but here it is: I think you should think twice about if you should work with Derek or not.”  
There. He’s said it.  
And Scott looks as disbelieving as Stiles feels.

“What? What are you talking about?” Scott lowers his voice to a frustrated whisper. “Are you crazy? Since when have you thought that? I thought we agreed that Derek…”

“Yeah, I know!” Stiles hisses back. “Do you think I don’t know? He’s just not a ray of sunshine and his plans for world domination come out his ass, and 80% of the time I feel like he has no idea what he’s doing- and that’s still a kind estimation. But Scott… _the alphas!_ ”

And then Scott comes out with his highly personal knock-out argument that Stiles can’t stand to hear any more. “But… Allison.”  
_Allison._

Stiles sighs. “I know.”

Scott moans. “No, you don’t know. If I side with Derek, I’ll lose her forever. She could probably forgive every other werewolf, but never Derek. He bit her mother, Stiles! Her mother!”

“If you’ve forgotten, he bit her to save you! Maybe you should tell her that!”

“I know. I know that. But I… I can’t lose her, man. Not permanently.”

“Scott, your priorities suck, but with all due respect – Alphas! A pack of alphas! That’s scary shit, okay? Imagine a pack full of Peters from before and then tell me that doesn’t make you afraid!”

Scott tugs at his hair. “I’m not even sure that I believe him! This may well be one of his stories, so I’ll submit to him! That was his goal in the beginning!”

“I’m not saying that you should sell your soul… like him.”

“I thought you were on my side!”

“I am…?” Struck, Stiles grabs for breath. “Of course I’m on your side, man! What do you think I’ve been doing for the last few weeks, except keep everyone off your back? I’m always on your side! Thank you for your trust!”

“Then don’t say that I should join his leather jackets club!” Scott makes a disgusted gesture in Stiles’ direction. “And why… why are you even wearing his jacket? God, you smell like him! Have you already decided? Is that it? You want to persuade me to join just so you can be one of them?”

“Have you even…?”

“Why don’t you ask him for the bite?!”

“Oh my God!” Stiles hisses. “You’re unbelievable!”

Scott’s face falls when he realizes that he has gone too far. “Stiles, wait. That’s not what I meant…”

“Yes, it was! You… you hairy werewolf ass! Bite me!”

With those words, Stiles turns and rushes out the door.  
The trouble is that it really hurts.  
Because Stiles has thought the exact same thing.

They have always been uncool together. And that was okay. To be uncool together is almost cool again.  
But ever since the night Scott was bitten he’s been different. Suddenly he isn’t a small, weak, asthmatic anymore, but the team captain who immediately grabbed the attention of one of the prettiest girls in school.  
Yes, Stiles is not blind. Allison is beautiful.  
And suddenly Stiles is uncool alone, he is suddenly the only one who doesn’t have super werewolf powers, and must always stay behind because he can’t even defend himself let alone help anyone else.

_‘I want to help… but I can’t do what you can.’_

His own word from a few days ago that feel like forever ago. Since then it’s been echoing in his ears.  
He can’t do what Scott can.  
He’s just… Stiles.  
Just a human.

“What was that?” Asks Lydia, who has been waiting on him a few feet away.

“Nothing.” He shakes his head. “Nothing at all, let’s go.”

Her strawberry blonde hair shimmers in the darkness, and she walks so close to him that he can feel her body heat and smell her perfume. It’s all he’s ever wanted and has never imagined it in his wildest dreams, yet it is also much more and much less than what he feels there.  
But, that’s exactly the problem. That is what is wrong with _everything_.  
Everything is too much or too little, too late or too early or not early enough. Everything is a lie and nothing real, and everything is a lot more painful.  
Stiles feels thin-skinned and emaciated as if Peter, Matt, and Gerard all carved something out of him one after another until there is nothing left of him. It’s as if every lie he told his father was a brick pushing him down into the ground until he is suffocated underneath it.

As if Lydia had read his thoughts, she pushes her arm through his and leans her head on his shoulder. “You never told me what happened to your face,” she says quietly.

It’s only been a few days, but it feels like an eternity. He thinks of Gerard and the Argent’s basement and Erica and Boyd, whom he had seen there for the last time before they disappeared.  
If he thinks about it, he can still taste the blood in his mouth.

“Gerard.” He tries shrug as if it were unimportant, but he doesn’t succeed. It’s a stumbling, half-finished movement and Lydia’s grip on his arm is solid.

“Okay.”

“It was just… It’s not really important.”

She sighs and even though it’s dark and he can’t see her face, he knows that she rolls her eyes. “Don’t be stupid. Of course, it’s important…”

He feels an almost involuntary smile tugging at his mouth. After that he is silent, and she doesn’t drill him, but he knows she can piece that part together.

She is silent too until they reach his jeep.  
“Is that the role of humans in this story?” She asks, throwing her hair over her shoulder. “We’re the victims and bail, but the werewolves don’t give us a chance to speak when the going gets tough? If so you better tell me right away, so I know what I’m getting into.”

He holds the door open for her and helps her into the jeep. “I hope not?”  
He hates himself that he sounds uncertain.  
It’s not as if it’s something he has asked himself often enough. Whether or not he’s nothing more than an annoying human appendage that runs after Scott, always coming too late and can never accomplish anything.

Lydia waits until he’s joined her and the engine turns before talking further. “Jackson didn’t even want me to be there this evening. He wouldn’t let me go by myself.”

Stiles gives her a quick glance before turning back to the road. There are very few topics that he wants to talk about less than Lydia relationship with Jackson. Or Jackson in general.

“He wants to wrap me up, preferably in cotton, I think,” Lydia continues mercilessly.

Stiles runs his tongue over his lower lip. He tastes blood and grimaces. “You can’t blame him if he tries to keep his girlfriend…”

“We aren’t back together.”

“What?” He focuses on the road and grabs the steering wheel with both hands.

Lydia plays with a reddish strand of hair and doesn’t look at him. In the muted street lamp light she appears in dazzling colors and tragic bluish-black shadows. She looks beautiful and tired, and Stiles can’t decide whether to stare at her or look away.

“No?” He asks gently.

“There is no relationship advice in Cosmo for the possibility that your boyfriend behaves like a total ass, turns into a murderous lizard before he commits suicide, and is brought back to life because of you!” Her voice cracks at the last words.

Stiles stares at her.

“What?” It sounds defiant.

“I… yeah. I can see how that makes reconciliation more difficult than ‘he is cheating on me with my poodle,’ or ‘my boyfriend is a vampire who sparkles.’”

She gives him a wry look. He bites his lower lip.  
“I’m sorry, I… it wasn’t…”

“It’s okay.” Her mouth twitches. “You’re awful.”

“I’m not! For your information, I’m great. I can’t help it if your relationship is… strange according to women’s magazines.” And that’s probably the understatement of the century.

She snorts. “Pah. Ironically, you have no right to judge me. As if your relationship with Derek is less strange.”

“My… what?” Stiles works his mouth and is speechless for a few seconds. How did she come up with…? What relationship is that…? How so…? What…? “What?”

Lydia raises a challenging eyebrows. “Just for your information: You two are totally bizarre. Every time he sees you, it looks like he doesn’t know whether he wants to bite you or devour you.”

“Bite! In the neck! I mean…” His mouth is once again faster than his brain and the unfortunate wording leaves him wincing before he finished speaking. “Not true,” he added lamely.

(As if your relationship with Derek is less strange.  
My… what?)

“The jacket thing is cute,” Lydia is thoughtfully and determinedly tapping a finger against the leather sleeve of the jacket. “A bit old fashioned, but I think he’s that type of guy.”

“What” Stiles slowly feels like he’s in the wrong movie. “That’s not… that wasn’t even…”

Stiles isn’t able to finish the sentence. Something with the force of a freight train rams into his car.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translator's Note-
> 
> Hi, all! So, Kazz here, with my first official translation! I'm a native English speaker, with an insane love of languages, and my favorite one is: German! I've been studying for nearly 10 years, my comprehension is pretty good imho, and I figured I could use more practice, so my drive to translate was born.
> 
> There is so much great fic out there that is sometimes inaccessible to others because of language (thank you American education system), and although the majority is in English, there are some really special gems out there in other languages that just need to be shared. 
> 
> I would go into philosophy, the great thoughts and beliefs behind the art, and yes it is an art, of translation, but I don't think many of you would be interested in that. But, on that note, I used the original formatting that Rei did, and everything is in her style, I just translated. I used some artistic license for word choices, but mostly I left it as it was. 
> 
> I'm so unbelievably stoked that Rei gave me permission to translate, I've actually been translating it for my own personal use for almost 9 months now, but since I finally got permission I can share it with all of you! 
> 
> PS. This has been proofread, but there is a chance some things might be awkward. I'll change them as soon as I get to them or as they are pointed out to me.  
> I plan to release a chapter every 7-9 days or so. I'd do more, but I kind of need a degree more than I need fic right now, so yeah...


	2. Cages of Air and Paper

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: Minor character death behind the scenes (whoever wants to be spoiled should read the epilogue, but trust me that neither Derek nor Stiles will believe it), a bit of blood, and I absolutely cannot write action scenes – but I tried? XD

Chapter 2: Cages of Air and Paper

The jeep spun off the road. Stiles will deny until his death that he made the high, panicky noise echoing through the car, but someone yells. And it’s not Lydia.  
He tries to brake. Tires screech on the asphalt. Lydia’s exclamation is abruptly cut off when she is thrown forward against the dashboard. The car jerks to one side and the sudden change of direction pulls Stiles’ hands off the wheels. His head bounces against the window of the driver’s seat and white spots explode before his eyes.

Almost in slow motion, it looks like the car tilts to one side.  
When he blinks again the Jeep rocks back unwieldy like a ship that hits a swell and ends up landing back on all four tires with a groan. A tremor goes through the whole vehicle.  
After a dizzying moment, he no longer knows which way is up and which way is down. Blood rushes in his ears, and for a few seconds, all the colors around him fade.

When he regains consciousness, they are upside down and across the road, half on top of the sidewalk.

“Stiles! _Stiles!_ Oh my God!” Lydia digs a hand into his shoulder and shakes him.  
Her hands tremble.

Stiles gasps. His lungs feel as if they’ve been compressed in a trash compactor, tight and crumpled, and there’s a tour de force before they unfold again. “What…?”

“I don’t know!”

He reaches for her hand instinctively and squeezes it. Lydia squeezes back.  
“Oh my God…” the moment when she was thrown forward flashes before his eyes and he quickly shifts closer. “Are you okay? Lydia!”

“Yes.” She nods nervously. Her hair has come out of her updo and drops around her face like a curtain. “Yes. I don’t know… Stiles, your head, you’re bleeding!”

The situation makes them unclench their fingers afterward, but at that moment something collides against the side of the Jeep and Stiles moves them closer together. Lydia’s fingers dig into the leather jacket.  
The back door is ripped open, and they both scream at the same time.  
A dark figure lands with a thud on his back seat.

“The pepper spray!” Stiles gasps. “The pepper spray! Quick, give me the– _Erica?!_ ”

Blonde, matted locks pour over his upholstery. He recognizes her hair and the way too revealing neckline. Her clothes are torn, and there are dark spots everywhere, it could be dirt, or… _oh my God is that blood?!_ Her breath rattles and little shudders run through her body.

“Derek…?” She breathes. She stretches her hand out to him, leaving bloody fingerprints on the seat. “Derek…” her voice breaks.

It sounds so lost and scared that Stiles has already crawled half over the seat before Lydia pulls him back. “Don’t!” She orders sharply. “Wait! You don’t know if you–“

Stiles continues to squeeze between the seats.  
Torn, he looks back and forth between Lydia and Erica. His breath resonates loudly in the cold night air. The rational part of his brain knows that Lydia is right and that it’s downright suicidal to approach a werewolf without knowing what their mental state is.  
But otherwise, the larger part of it…

“Erica…” he whispers. “Erica?” He stretches his hand out towards her.

His fingertips touch the shredded material of her jacket, and she winces as if an electric shock had gone through it.  
Her head snaps up. Her eyes are wide open and light yellow. Her canines are extended, and she is in full beta mode.  
Lydia inhales sharply.

“Erica…” Stiles buries his fingertips in her jacket. He doesn’t let go. “Erica, it’s me. Stiles. It’s okay. You're all right.” His voice is shaking, and he hopes mid-sentence, that it won’t make him a liar.

The yellow lights fade, like a candle going out, and her eyes are brown again. “Stiles.” It sounds like a statement and a question at the same time.  
Something trembles in her face, and she shudders. “Quick, we have to… please…” She gasps and her claws dig into the seat cushion. “We have to go!”

Stiles tumbles back into the driver’s seat. He already has one hand on the key before his brain kicks in.  
Of course… of course. Anything that is able to scare a werewolf is something you don’t want to stick around to find out what it is.  
Lydia’s hands fly to her purse which was thrown to the ground by the impact. Erica is crawling across the seat and pulls the car door open. His fingers are slippery with blood.

The motor rattles and makes gasping noises. It won’t start.  
No, no, no. Not now! Not here and now. Stiles’ heart stumbles in his chest, and he beats on the steering wheel. “Turn on!” He curses.

Erica screams, less than half a second later something crashes into the passenger door. It is the only warning he gets before the window next to Lydia is broken into a thousand pieces. Glass shards rain down on her. With a cry, Lydia pulls a small black can from her purse.

“Spray, spray, spray!” Stiles hisses simultaneously with Erica shouting “let’s go, let’s go!” and drumming against the back of his seat.

It’s a hand with claws that comes through the window, a woman’s hand.  
_Werewolf.  
_ Lydia doesn’t wait until the corresponding faces appear to stretch out the pepper spray and presses the button. A high-pitched whine is heard, and the hand disappears.

Reflexively, Erica pulls an arm up to her face and bends down behind the driver’s seat. Stiles can only imagine how much worse the sharp spray must be for werewolves’ senses if it’s already bringing tears to his eyes. He turns his head to the side and presses his eyes closed, his hand is still on the keys.  
Please, he thinks, _please_.

There is a tortured whine from the engine accompanied by an angry growl that comes from outside. Whatever is out there, they’ve made it really mad.  
Stiles presses the gas pedal all the way down and an endless stream of prayers and curses rattle through his brain like a railroad.  
_PleasepleasefuckfuckfuckrunrunrunpleasemydadIcannotpleaserunrunrun…_  
“Go!” Lydia shouts. She holds the pepper spray in front of him like a weapon and clings to his seat with her free hand.

The Jeep makes a sudden leap forward. The tires lurch, but the engine is running, and they can drive, oh thank God, they can drive.  
His hands fly to the clutch, and it gives an alarming rattle as the transmission kicks in. The gas pedal vibrates under his shoe when he pushes all the way down. The road is racing by them.

A black shadow is in his rearview mirror.  
They lurch. Stiles doesn’t know if he’s trembling or if it’s the whole car that shakes. The engine sputters and he’s pretty sure that something is broken, considering how hard Erica rammed into it.  
Just a little bit, he thinks, just hold out for a little bit.  
His eyes water and the roadway shifts up and down.  
Trees rustle left and right as they pass, but the black shadow behind them gets smaller, and eventually disappears.

The Jeep can’t even hold out for a mile before it starts to stutter. It jolts and the engine spits before it goes out with a final death rattle. They jolt a few meters further along the tarmac before thin threads of smoke start rising from the hood.

Lydia is the first to say it. “Shit.”

“Shit,” Stiles echoes.

He sinks back in his seat and closes his eyes.  
Just for a second.  
He is nauseous, and he isn’t sure if that’s because of the adrenaline that pulsed through his veins or because everything rocks up and down and is blurred and out of focus in front of him.  
A monster is behind them. And Erica Reyes is bleeding to death in his backseat.

“Erica…”

She whimpers. It’s a quiet, heartbreaking noise and it brings him to open his eyes again.  
She is curled up so small that he can’t detect anything but blonde, tousled hair and black leather in the rearview mirror.

“What happened?” He asks helplessly. “Who was that? And what about Boyd?”

Her answer is so low that he hardly understands it. “Boyd is dead.”

Oh God.  
Stiles breathes slowly.  
Something breaks inside him, something he didn’t even know was there.

“The alphas?” He doesn’t even need to hear her quiet confirmation to know that he is right.

They killed Boyd.  
Blood rushes in his ears.  
They killed a teenager. Someone who was sitting two rows in front of him and whining about biology in the cafeteria over the same mushy _‘Ground Beef Surprise’_ that Stiles had.

“How did you…? How did you find us? Why…?”

“You smell like him.” She whispers. “I thought he… You smell like… pack.”

Like _him_?  
It takes a moment until he puts together her broken phrases and even then he doesn’t understand them.  
After Derek?  
Why should…  
Stiles unconsciously digs his hand into the leather jacket.  
Of course.  
_Of course._  
He clenches his teeth, angry about his own denseness. That leather jacket has to be practically saturated with Eau de Derek. He draws her in. The smell is probably a beacon in the dark for werewolves that they can recognize for miles, _‘Hale,’ ‘alpha,’ ‘werewolf,’ and ‘pack.’_

“Stiles,” says Lydia. “We have to leave.” Stiles nods and then stops short. The familiar feeling of a panic attack starts to rise in his chest. It’s as if someone is tying something around his throat.

But he can’t have a panic attack now. Not now. Not here. Not in the middle of a deserted country road in the middle of nowhere, with an alpha less than a mile behind them, and a bloody werewolf in the back seat.

They can’t get out and run for miles through the woods. That would be suicide. They need help. They need a functioning car. And at least a ton of aconite or mountain ash. They need…

Holy shit.

They need Derek.

With trembling hands, he fishes out his cell phone from his pocket.

Lydia gives him a look. “Who are you calling? Scott?”

He shakes his head and grits his teeth to suppress the wave of nausea that rolls over him. “Scott has a car.”  
And Scott is not an alpha, he adds as an afterthought. If the monster appears again, Scott has no chance. Neither do Jackson or Isaac.  
No. They need Derek.

His hands are soaked in sweat, and the stupid touchscreen under his fingers moves back and forth. Cursing, he scrolls through his contacts until he arrives at G for #Grumpywolf.  
_Pick up_ , he thinks, _please pick up._

“What?” Derek’s voice sounds irritated and impatient, but still, Stiles has never been so happy to hear his acidic voice. He laughs and almost chokes on it.

“Derek…” His voice brakes on the second syllable. “Derek, I...”

“What happened?” Derek’s voice changes abruptly. “Stiles? What's going on?”

Stiles takes a deep breath and pushes his palms into his eyes. _Pull yourself together, man._

“ _Stiles!_ ” Derek growls, obviously not happy with how long Stiles takes to respond. And the: “Your heart beat…”

“We were attacked by an alpha!” Stiles says quickly and thinks _My heartbeat?!_ Seriously?  
He may think that his heart pounds and stumbles like a rabbit’s heartbeat, but he doesn’t need a werewolf who rubs him the wrong way to tell him that he’s scared.  
“We have… Erica is here,” he stammers. “Someone is after her. We’ve lost them, but I don’t know for how long. We’re in the woods, and my car is shot and… _howfastcanyoubehere?_ ” Because that’s really the only question that matters.

 

(Pick up… please pick up. – What? – Derek, Derek I… - What’s happening?  
We were attacked by an **alpha**! We have… **Erica is here**. Someone is after her.  
We’ve lost them, but we don’t know for how long. We’re **in the middle of the woods,** and _my car is dead_ and…  
**Howfastcanyougethere?** )

“Are you hurt? Stiles!”

“No, I…”

“Where are you?”

“On the road,” stammers Stiles. “Middle of the forest. We were on our way to Lydia’s.”

“Stay where you are!” Derek orders sharply.  
“Lock the doors.”

“Lock the doors?” Stiles laughs shakily. “Dude, they smashed my window like it was cotton candy. I don’t think locking the doors will help us.”

For a few seconds, there is silence from the other end of the line.  
He knows that Derek knows that a car door won’t stop a werewolf, and certainly not an alpha. They’re caught like rats in a trap, in a cage made of air and paper. They can lock the doors, keep their fingers crossed, hope, and it’ll all be useless if Derek isn’t here in time.

An engine start and Stiles can almost feel the vibration of the Camaro as the powerful, black car speeds forward. It’s a familiar, almost comforting sound.

“I’ll be right there.”  
It sounds like a promise.  
Stiles really hopes it is one.  
He would like to experience his high school graduation. And maybe even his college graduation, if that’s not asking too much.

He lowers the phone. “Do you have any more pepper spray?” He asks Lydia.

She shakes the little black spray bottle and shakes her head. “Not enough. Not even enough for the summer sales.”

He gives her a sidelong glance. “Sometimes you scare me, Lyds. A lot.”

-

They’ve retreated into the back seat. Not because it’s any safer, but the passenger seat is covered in glass, and Stiles wasn’t going to leave Erica alone back there. Not when they’re so messed up, and it’s triggering terrible flashbacks to that night he spent in Derek’s awful train yard, with her quivering body in his arms.

He kneels on the bloodstained upholstery, with Erica’s head in his lap, and the sound of an approaching car is growing larger.

“Who is that?” breathes Lydia. “Is that Derek?” She kneels behind him and leans against his back, the can of pepper spray in her hand ready to defend him. Even without being a werewolf, Stiles can practically feel her heart pounding wildly against his ribs.

“Yeah.” He takes his hand from Erica’s forehead.  
Her eyelashes flutter, and she gives a faint indignant noise.  
“It’s okay,” he whispers softly. “It’s alright.”  
She has black smudges of smeared mascara under her eyes that give them a hollow and haggard look, and she has her face buried in his lap like a frightened child. There’s so much blood that he thinks it’s dangerous, and her accelerated super healing powers are doing fuck all for her at the moment.

Metal crunches as someone abruptly tears away the door to his backseat. Erica whimpers and Stiles rolls his eyes. He probably should have told Derek that his over dramatized performances aren’t appropriate right now.

“Please don’t traumatize your betas longer than necessary. She’s had enough…”  
A hand shoots over Erica and buries itself in Stiles’ T-shirt. Surprised he blinks. “Hey, what…?  Don’t strangle me? What’ve I _done_ to you?”

“Stiles!”

“What the hell, man?”

Derek’s eyes flicker over his face for a few seconds as he tries to convince himself that Stiles is in one piece. Then he buries his fingers firmly in the thin fabric. “You’re wearing my jacket!”

“…Seriously?” Hisses Stiles. His heart gives a painful jerk. “This is what you what you want to talk about now? Me having your jacket…? You… you can get your stupid jacket back later!”

“You shouldn’t have taken it!”

“You should have stopped me!”

“This isn’t…! I was…” Derek shows his teeth and growls louder as if that were an acceptable substitute for a complete sentence.

“Could we clear this up another time?” Lydia hisses from the back.

Stiles nods emphatically without averting his eyes from Derek’s face. “Let me go! My night got completely fucked up, and I’m not really in the mood, and I didn’t do anything!”

Derek rumbles as if he doesn’t agree with that statement on principle, but Erica interrupts their moment.

“Derek…” She coughs. It sounds wet and painful as if at least one of her ribs is broken.

Stiles puts a comforting on her shoulder. “We don’t have time for this! She needs help!” He hisses.

Derek retracts his claws and lets his hand fall. He nods. His throat moves as he swallows. For a moment he looks very young, young and overwhelmed like it was in the train yard when Erica hadn’t stopped convulsing.

Slowly, he breathes out. “Deaton,” he says shortly, and at least that sounds like a sensible decision.  
He reaches for Erica and lifts her up as if she weighs less than a cotton ball. Her head falls lifeless against his chest, and her hair pours like a golden waterfall over his shoulder. Stiles can’t bear to look.

“Get out,” Derek orders. “We’ll take my car.”

Stiles stumbles out of the car so hastily, he almost tumbles headlong onto the tarmac. “What? Wait a minute! What about the Jeep?”

Derek throws a glance at him over his shoulder. “There’s just nothing I can do for your car. Apart from giving it a coup de grace.”

Stiles gasps. “Now listen to me you –!”

“Stiles!” Lydia hisses and grabs his arm. “Priorities!”

They drag him away, and he lets it happen because he doesn’t want to fight them. Not now. Not if her body is littered with tiny bleeding scratches and crescent-shaped marks on his arm from her fingernails because she’s clinging so tightly to him so that he doesn’t know how she stumbles.

He throws one last sad look back at the wreckage that is his Jeep. It’s a little off the road on the shoulder and looks awful. Perhaps Stiles can arrange a tow truck tomorrow. And think about whether or not he’d have to prostitute himself this time to scrap enough money for the repairs. If there’s anything left to repair.  
The thought makes him twinge.

It’s only when he falls on Derek’s precious upholstered seats that he realizes he’s still wearing the damned leather jacket.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Afterword: Surprise!Erica! <33 I’m going to completely ignore the whole Erica s3 canon stuff because NO WAY. Not happening. Unfortunately, I had to make a sacrifice somewhere, and Boyd was it. Sorry Boyd!
> 
> Other: In the series, many werewolf abilities are addressed but never explored any further, and I find that very unfortunate. That’s what I mean to do in the FF here (hence the name of the rose).
> 
> About this chapter: In 2x05 Erica mentioned to Scott that she can smell Allison on him “anywhere.” So werewolves are apparently able to  
> a.) Recognize people by smells and distinguish them and  
> b.) Perceive these smells on objects or other people.  
> I’m guessing that these skills are more pronounced in an alpha or a born werewolf than a beta or a freshly bitten wolf. Also, I’m going to assume that betas are tuned into their alpha and are able to smell them over long distances and that pack members can be recognized by each other faster than outsiders (because that makes sense). (That goes for real wolves and other herd animals in general. So when your cat or dog rubs against you, then he/she does it to distribute their scent on you as a member of their pack. True facts.)


	3. More or less undamaged

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: Warning for this chapter: Well-intentioned, but overly handsy behavior (Derek), hurt/comfort, fear, Stilinski family feels, and misunderstandings. Have fun?

Erica looks small and lifeless on the sterile metal table in the center of the clinic. Deaton putters around her and mumbles things that Stiles can’t understand. He’s disturbingly calm and collected. He’s not surprised when they appear in the middle of the night, and Stiles would find it less disconcerting if they could sometimes seem to wake him up and have him react.

Derek has his head down, firmly holding Erica’s hand. His face is completely motionless, but he winces whenever she makes small breathless sounds of pain. Isaac is there holding her other hand. Someone has to have notified him, or maybe there is an internal pack-tracking device that tells when another member of the pack is in trouble. Stiles has no idea how that works.  
Nobody talks about Boyd, and Stiles can’t bring himself to tell them about what left her lips, what Erica told him, but everyone probably already suspects what happened.

Stiles paces back and forth and chews on his fingernails. For the third time in five minutes, he reaches for his cell phone. His fingers hover undecidedly over Scott’s number before he pushes it back into his pocket without calling.

A hand settles on his shoulder abruptly, and he stops, feeling caught.  
It’s Lydia. “Jackson will be here soon,” she says. “He’ll take me home.”

Oh shit. Jackson. “I guess he wasn’t happy about what happened,” he says guiltily.

“Hm,” Lydia hums and turning a strand of her hair.  
She traces her smeared lipstick and tries to fix her hair, and she looks so much more put together than she did half an hour or so ago.  
He doesn’t know how she does it. No one can get their act together like Lydia can. Lydia can make ‘keeping it together’ look like an Olympic event in which she holds all the world records.  
Stiles envies her sometimes.

“Has he threatened to bite off my head?” he asks. “He’s done this for years and you know, now that he’s a werewolf I’m seriously…”

Lydia sighs. “He won’t hurt you. He was worried about you.”

“Yeah, right.” Stiles snorts in disbelief. “I want to experience the day when Jackson Whittemore is concerned about my welfare.”

Lydia shrugs and pulls out her make-up mirror. She pouts and uses her fingertips on her upper lip to correct the places where she painted over the edge. “He asked if he should have already contacted McCall about your tragic death or if he can expect to be bothered by your existence.”

Stiles dramatically presses his hands on his chest. “I’ve never heard such sincere concern,” he declares. “It really warms your heart.”

Lydia rolls her eyes and starts to paint her eyelashes. Stiles watches her doing it. Her movements are experienced, done with military precision, and are strangely soothing.  
Maybe he should try makeup sometime, take advantage of its calming effects. God knows he needs it. The calming effect, not the makeup.  
On the other hand, it could also be something he needs. Especially since he is surrounded by people with forever flawless skin.

“How are you?” asks Lydia, without looking up.

“Fine.” It comes automatically, without thinking. “I’m fine.”

“Of course.” It sounds strangely gentle. “There you go again; you’re always fine.”

He nods, unable to reply with something sarcastic. “Apart from my wrecked car and apart from the fact that my dad will kill me if he finds out. Oh, and apart from having a friend of mine who was half-dead lie in my lap and having an alpha try to kill us, but hey, it’s just another day, right? How are you? What are these…?” He points unsteadily towards her upper arm.

“Oh please.” She sounds disdainful. “They’re only scratches. It won’t stop me from wearing a bikini in the summer.”

Lydia Martin in a bikini is a mental image that would normally make all his higher brain functions cease, but not today. Not here. Instead, it makes him think wistfully of the simpler times when the biggest problem in his everyday life was the question of whether or not she would notice him.

“Thanks,” he says impulsively.

Her eyebrows fly up. “For what?”

“You saved my ass. And Erica. I’m not sure we would have gotten off so well without your hardcore pepper spray skills.”

She raises a corner of her mouth into a small, arrogant smile, and doesn’t deny it.

“Team Homo Sapiens, right?”

“Team Homo!” He goes for a high five, but her scathing gaze makes him drop his hand quickly. “No high-fiving. Alright. High-fiving is uncool. Sorry. I… uh… Oh? What…?”

He startles in the middle of the sentence as she steps forward and presses a kiss to his cheek.  
“Yes,” she mummers softly and directly into his ear, and Stiles’ heart does a surprised somersault. “High-fiving is uncool.”

But kissing obviously isn’t.  
Okay. Okay. Alright. Stiles can live with that.  
As soon as he can actually breathe again.

Outside, tires squeal. From the corner of his eyes, Stiles sees Derek and rolls his eyes. He probably thinks he has the monopoly on dramatically squealing tires. And then Jackson is there. He ignores Derek and the Beta, and Stiles is probably nothing more than a speck of dust in his eye line. All he sees is Lydia.

He grabs her by the arm, and it looks more gruff than tender, but his eyes flicker over her face as if to make sure that she is really there.

Lydia raises a dismissive hand. “Please don’t hug me. My lipstick is fresh.”

“Lydia,” he groans.

She throws her hair back and marches past him. “Now don’t just stand there. If you hurry, I can still get to sleep six hours.”

Jackson growls, frustrated, and looks like he wants to tear out his hair. Stiles can understand that. The two really give the expression ‘love hurts’ a whole new meaning. It doesn’t only hurt them; it’s an internationally recognized form of torture.

For a second, he finds himself thinking that he is probably much better off by just being Lydia's new best friend. She's a Fury when you're with her. Admirable and magnificent, but definitely a Fury.

Jackson's gaze sweeps into Stiles as though he had read his mind. “And you ...!” He hisses.  
Stiles blinks innocently at him. "What?"  
“You ...!” Jackson bares his teeth before he drops his hand. “Do you need a ride?” He sounds like it's physically paining him to ask that and it takes a moment for Stiles to process the words.

Come again?

“Yes or no?” Jackson snaps, seemingly uncomfortable by asking at all. “The offer stands for three seconds; three, two, one! _Tough luck_ , loser.”

“Okay,” Stiles calls after him. “I’m going home. Super! Um… Thanks?”

It’s actually a bit creepy as if Jackson is trying to be nice to him in his own asshole-ish way. Very unusual. And scary.

He doesn’t even know if he would have said ‘yes’ in other circumstances. There’s nothing he can do here anyway.  
The thought of his warm bed at home is tempting. His car is over there. He's angry at Scott and Erica still looks more dead than alive.  
Stiles sighs and closes his eyes. He's cold, and Derek's stupid leather jacket hangs two feet away from him over a chair, warm and inviting, but he doesn’t dare slip it on.

–

“Stiles.”

Someone shakes him.  
“Five minutes, Dad…” Stiles mutters, his whole head is heavy and his entire left side pulsating to the rhythm of his heartbeat. Ugh.  
Hopefully, the party was at least worth it. That he can’t remember it, should be a good sign…  
  
“Stiles. Wake up.”

Hold on.  
That’s not his Dad.

“Stiles!”

Oh shit. There was no a party.

“Stiles, wake up. Or I’ll rip your throat out!”

Okay, _that_ is definitely not his dad.

Stiles blinks. A bright oval floats above him, blurred but in focus like a soap bubble. He blinks and tries to focus.

Something touches his temple and he jerks back.

“ _... Derek?_ ”

“You said, that you weren’t hurt.” It sounds like an accusation. “You said you were okay.”

Stiles stumbles to his feet off the bench and takes a few steps to put distance between himself and Derek.  
He reaches for the sink with one hand to steady himself as the room spins around him. He feels disoriented and unreal, and it takes a moment for him to realize where he is (in a back room of Deaton's practice), and what Derek has just said.

A quick glance into the mirror above the stink tells him that his left temple has darkened in the last few hours and now shimmers in beautiful blue and lilac tones. Dried blood sticks in his hair. He grimaces. That looks nasty.  
“I _am_ okay,” he murmurs, wetting a paper towel, and trying to wipe away the blood beneath his hairline.

Derek makes a rude sound as if he doesn’t agree with this assessment at all.

“Well, mostly,” Stiles corrects. “I’m more or less undamaged.”  
He isn’t quite sure which blood is his and which is Erica’s and the paper towels only help so much. Resigned, he finally gives up and turns around.

He immediately stumbles back. A 6ft pissed werewolf stands in front of him, far too close, and as immovable as a concrete wall. Stiles hadn’t even noticed that Derek moved at all.

“We’ve talked about this,” he said, ignoring the wild beating of his heart. “Personal space, okay? This is _my_ space bubble, and that is _your_ space bubb-... hey. Hey! What? _What is that?_ ”

Derek stretches out his hand. Fingertips touch his temples and Stiles holds his breath so abruptly that he almost chokes on it. This is…  
What is this?

“Hey! Hey! Not okay!” He waves his arms.

“Hold still!” Derek whispers. “How did that happen?” It sounds hostile and so pissed off like someone had pissed in his corn flakes this morning.

“I had an unpleasant encounter with the window pane when my car flew off the road,” Stiles answers truthfully.

“The Alpha?”

“I actually think this was Erica. She rammed into us like a cannonball.” Stiles shrugs his shoulders. Behind him, the cold corner of the wash basin jabs into his hip and he can’t back up anymore. He’s cornered, and Derek is so close to him that he only needs to inhale once, and their chests would touch. “It's OK. She was running for her life. Compared to that, what’s a fender-bender, right?”

“Does it hurt?”

“Ouch! Yeah, dude, it hurts when you push on it! I’m not an orange you can squeeze! 100% human chew toy here, okay?”

Derek sighs and rolls his eyes. “Don’t be a baby.”

Stiles gives him a dirty look but is distracted by the fact that Derek, without warning (personal space, okay? That’s not okay!), and presses his entire palm on Stiles’ throbbing temples. Stiles opens his mouth and immediately closes it. He bites his teeth in anticipation of pain that never comes. He has no idea what… oh. Oh.  
_Oh._

“What is that? What are you doing?” He stares at Derek with wide eyes.

 He has no idea what’s happening, but it feels warm. The throb in his head decreases just as though he’d taken an aspirin. Or ten. And smoked some weed. A cotton-soft feeling is spreading in his head as his pain recedes in slowly pulsating waves.  
Speechless, Stiles watches Derek lower his hand. Something dark, like black ink, winds through his veins, and for a second, Derek’s face contorts like he were in pain. It disappears so fast that Stiles almost believes he’s hallucinating.

“What…? How did you…?” Stiles blinks and gently touches his temple; the bump is still as big as it was before, but it doesn’t hurt as much as it did a few moments ago. “Did you just… _suck away_ my pain?”

“Yes. Stop messing with it.”  
As if he had just noticed how close they were to each other, Derek turned abruptly and took a step back.

“Yes?” Stiles repeats. “ _Yes?!_ Why didn’t anyone tell me you could do something like that? Is that a werewolf thing? An Alpha thing? Can Scott do it? Wait... is that why you held Erica's hand? Because you… Absorbed her pain?”

Derek gives him a look that makes it quite clear he doesn’t like Stiles’ concern. Okay. _Okay._ Stiles lifts his hands defensively and makes a note of this interesting, little fact for later.

For a second, it’s quiet between them. The only sound is Stiles’ own breath, as it echoes loudly through the small room. His head feels warm and foggy, but that might just be the endorphins that are rushing through his body, looking for a pain that mysteriously disappeared into Nirvana.

“Boyd…” he says hesitantly, and Derek winces as if someone had hit him.  
That answers all the questions he had about what Erica told him.

“I’m sorry,” Stiles says softly, feeling helpless.

Involuntarily, Derek takes a few steps back and shakes his head defiantly, as if he can’t bear to talk or even think about it.  
Stiles can understand that. If he so much as thinks about it, he feels quite faint and miserable, even though he didn’t really know Boyd that well.

Hesitantly he runs his tongue over his lower lip. "How is Erica?" He asks, “Will she be okay?”

“She’ll pull though.” Derek pauses briefly before adding, “Isaac is staying with her tonight. It helps if…” He makes a wordless gesture.

“The physical presence of the pack accelerates the healing process,” Stiles finishes. “Hey, it isn’t that much different from humans, there are studies that prove that…” He interrupts himself mid-sentence, because now really isn’t the time to throw around random knowledge. “That’s good,” he says instead. “That she isn’t alone. That’s… That’s good.”

Derek nods.  
“Thank you,” he says hesitantly, and it sounds like the word is in a completely foreign language to him.

“For what?”

Derek crosses his arms, uncomfortably, in front of his chest and turns his eyes away. His flawless profile is a dark silhouette against the dimly lit window. “You could have just left.”

And leave Erica alone to her fate? Yeah, of course.  
Frustrated, Stiles raises his arms. “Seriously? Have we met? That’s not something I do. You can’t be that slow to realize it.”

“Someday, you’ll leave,” Derek says, and it sounds odd, like the thought doesn’t particularly please him. “You and your little friend.”

“Because we’re human?” Stiles challenges.

“Because you’re teenagers.” His voice sounds rough. “And insane.”

It sounds soft and almost miserable, and Stiles feels all his anger fizzle away, like air from a punctured balloon. He doesn’t protest because worse things have already been said about him. And he doesn’t want to argue with Derek. Not when he looks so exhausted and helpless, and as if everything is slipping away from him.  
All the sharp edges of his face are softened by the dim light and fatigue in his features.

Stiles can relate to that. He feels speechless and unreal as if he is standing 6 feet away from himself and his body is only reacting with delayed responses. The night was so long and so much has happened, and he feels like he hasn’t slept in, like, a hundred hours. He is shivering with fatigue and involuntarily clasps his arms in front of his chest.

Derek makes a sound that is somewhere between resignation and frustration. “Idiot. You could have kept the jacket if you were so cold…”

“ _I’m_ the idiot?” Stiles replies. “No thank you! The last time I had your ‘leather baby’ in my unworthy fingers, you _growled_ at me!”

“That wasn’t…” Derek shakes his head. “Anyway, it’s too late now.”

“Too late?”

“Forget it.”

Thanks for the cryptic conversation that didn’t clear anything up.  
Stiles has the vague feeling that he should be angry, but he’s actually more upset. It’s a stupid and senseless to be feeling offended, just because Derek obviously finds him so repulsive and can’t even stand him enough to want Stiles anywhere near his stupid jacket. And what is “too late?” Is it contaminated with Stiles’ bacteria now, or what?

‘ _Too late._ ’  
“What time is it anyway?” His voice sounds strange, and rough, even to his own ears.

“Just past four thirty.”

“Four thir-…” It takes a moment for Stiles to process because that means he’s slept here for at least two hours. Huh. “Oh shit, Shit! Fuck!”

Derek lifts his head. “What?”

“My dad…” Stiles runs his hand over his short-cropped hair and curses softly. “He had the night shift, but he’ll be home at any minute, and when he sees I’m not in bed… I’m gonna be grounded for the rest of my life! Goddamnit.”

Derek sighs in a way that makes it seem like Stiles' whole existence is the single, greatest inconvenience for him. "Come on. I’ll take you home."

\--

For the second time tonight, Stiles is sitting in Derek’s Camaro.  
The world rushes past him, faster and quieter than it ever is in the Jeep as if he is sitting in a bell jar. The sun isn’t visible yet, but the horizon is already colored with soft pink and orange tones, and the sky above them is more gray than black.  
Derek is silent, and Stiles has his arms crossed, chewing on his thumbnail, and is trying not to look at the clock too often. The clock is ticking.  
If he’s lucky, his father will stop for a coffee or breakfast on the way back. If he’s even luckier, Deputy Johnson will stop him to show him pictures of her twin girls.  
Unfortunately, his father has the habit of always checking his room when he comes home, no matter how early or late. So if Stiles is really unlucky, he only has about seven minutes get home, run up the stairs, pull his jeans off his hips, jump under his comforter, and pretend he had a peaceful and uneventful night.

It's three streets before they turn into his when Derek says something for the first time. “What's that?”

“What?” Stiles blinks tiredly.

Instead of answering, Derek points forward. Over the edge of the house roofs, Stiles can recognize colored lights. He frowns. “I don’t know. It's definitely too early for a barbecue.”  
He is strikingly alert in his seat. It is a flickering, rotating light, like...

It’s Derek who says it. “Those are emergency lights.”

Stiles’ heart stumbles in the middle of a beat, and it takes a moment for it to settle again. There are emergency lights in his neighborhood.  
His dad…  
No. _No._ That’s impossible. It can’t be. He must still be at work. His shift isn’t over for another three minutes.  

_What if something happened to him?_ Whispers a voice in his head, which is never completely silent, and only quiets down when he knows his father is safely in the next room.  
Being sheriff is a dangerous job. So many things could happen, even in a small town like Beacon Hills. A shootout. A chase. A junkie that attacks. A knife-fight. A bar brawl that escalates. Terrorists.  
Psychopathic werewolves.  
Stiles has too much imagination and too much time, and his brain effortlessly produces one nightmare scenario after another. It is not as if this is something new or that’s only come into being because of the emergence of supernatural creatures in his life.  
Ever since he was eleven years old, he’s been waiting on the call with a muted voice saying _‘Stiles… Your father…’_ and then he’ll know what happened before the sentence is even finished.

“Derek,” he says, feeling more than seeing Derek accelerate.

The flashing lights are right in front of his house. His heart makes a dizzying downhill ‘plop’ into his stomach.

“No…” Stiles presses his hands against the window pane, feeling like all the air was sucked out of the car.  
There are two police cars sitting on the lawn in front of his house, both still flickering their lights. The door to the house is wide open, and he sees uniformed people running around everywhere. Police officers. Fire department. Paramedics.

“Oh my God…” he moans, “Oh no, no, no. No!”

He’s had nightmares that started the same way.

"Stiles." Derek does a U-turn to the other side of the street, presumably to stop somewhere, but all Stiles registers is that they’re continuing to move away from his house.

“Let me out!” Stiles tugs at his seatbelt. “Stop! _Stop right now!_ ”

“Stiles, wait, you can’t…”

Stiles is already halfway out of the car before the Camero comes to a stop. Derek swears, stepping on the brakes. Stiles slides on the morning dew covered grass and staggers against the still open car door. He didn’t waste time trying to close it.

“Dad? Dad!”  
He runs. Hammering the asphalt under his feet.  
“DAD!”  
Blood rushes in his ears.  
It is like a déjà vu. He’s seen it all before. The lights, the police cars. But this time it is in front of his house. It's right on his doorstep. Why would they be here, unless… Unless…

“Where’s my father? Have you seen my father?”  
He grabs the shoulders of familiar uniforms, but none of the faces is the right one. “Where is my… dad? DAD?!”

Hands reach for him, but he tears himself free. He flails and stumbles to the side. “Hey, this is Stilinski’s kid!”  
“Now calm down.” Someone grabs his upper arm, and Stiles is pressed painfully against the side of the house as someone shakes him. But before he can defend himself against the rough treatment, Derek is suddenly there and growling, and the strange hand on his neck disappears instantly. Stiles hears a dark rumbling and a tiny part of him hopes that Derek is composed enough not to expose his teeth here and now.

“ _DAD!_ ”

His voice echoes loudly in his own ears. He rushes over the threshold into the living room, past questioning faces, and uninformed people. His wallpaper swirls past him like a carousel, and his chest feels tighter and tighter. And then finally… Finally…

“Let me through! Let me though! That’s my son, that’s… Stiles! STILES!”

The arms grab him, but this time they’re the right ones. His father’s face blurs in front of his eyes and Stiles could fall to his knees in relief.  
“Dad…” He squeezes out.

“Stiles,” his father says, “Stiles, oh my God…”

He is pressed against a broad chest. Stiles practically falls on him and buries his face in his father’s neck. He’s almost certain that he’s crying and is just as sure that he doesn’t care if anyone sees him doing it.  
He feels like he’s suffocating. His heart is racing inside his chest, faster and more painful than ever before. His father holds him so tight that it almost hurts and Stiles just buries his hands in the back of his father’s uniform jacket.

He has no idea what happened, but it must be something bad since the entire sheriff's office is here and his dad looks so disheveled.

There are hands on his face and his neck, and his dad is running his fingers over his forehead and cheeks. Stiles is sure that his dad is talking to talk to him. But the words all mix together and all he hears is the panic in his father’s voice.

“…–appened? Stiles? What happened?”

Stiles blinks, unable to make sense of it. Happened? Why would _he_ know what happened?

It isn’t until he steps away from his father that he realizes the hustle and bustle around them has come to a sudden standstill. Half a dozen uniformed people are standing around them, all staring at him, with varying facial expressions, somewhere between relief and disbelief, that for a second, Stiles feels like a circus attraction.  
Over their heads, he glances at Derek. His eyes are wide, and he shakes his head, almost imperceptibly.

“What's going on here?” Stiles asks. “Dad? What happened?”

“Stiles ... we found the Jeep.” His father's Adam’s apple bobs strongly as he swallows.

“What?”

“You were gone and ... all the blood ...”

 

**Continues next chapter**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Author's Afterword:** I really wanted to stop a few lines earlier, but I thought that it was, perhaps, too nasty a cliff hanger (and I could never do that to the Sheriff anyway, I LOVE Stiles’ Dad!)  
>  Hands up, who also thinks that Sheriff Stilinski is great and would like to read a Stilinski-family one-shot by me? XD  
>  **Fact & Fiction:** The whole “pain can be absorbed” thing is canon, and has already been discussed in the series, see episodes 2x11, 3x07, and 3x08. A few additional true facts about wolves: They are pack animals and have very pronounced social behavior. When an animal is weakened, the social behavior of the wolves is particularly pronounced. As a rule, the other members take care of the injured and weakened animal until it is healthy again. And positive body contact actually has a positive effect on any type of disease or injury, both in humans and in animals. :-) Human contact can help with pain as Scott so beautifully said, and that is really true. 
> 
> **Translator's afterword:** _HOLY. CRAP._ I am really late and sorry about that. This chapter was only around 4050 words, but translating is **_no joke_**. It's hard, but I love it. And it helps that German isn't a dead language. I'm taking intensive Latin right now and want to string myself up by my own hair. WHY IS AN INFINITIVE IN LATIN NOT ACTUALLY WHAT MOST PEOPLE WOULD CALL AN INFINITIVE?! Haben  <\-- to have an infinitive vs. habere, habui, habitum <\-- to have, BUT ONLY IN ACTIVE VOICE. W.H.Y?! "Latin is logical," they said, "it'll make sense, soon enough," they said; ha! *goes back to scribbling madly in her notebook book*
> 
> But /anyway/ yeah, German is great, I love it and I love translating this story for you! I hope you're enjoying reading it, and don't forget to drop a line to Rei, the actual author, and let them know how much you enjoy it.  
> Any comments or suggestions are greatly appreciated! :D  
> Til chapter 4!


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